Books: How to
Be Idle, by Tom Hodgkinson (HarperCollins, 2005, 286 pages.)

A

Maybe Christmas isn’t the best time of year for How to Be Idle. Maybe
they knew what they were doing when they released this back in summer
(don’t forget, it’s still officially Fall). Then again, that’s why you
should read it now.

“The fear that keeps you chained to your desk, staring at your screen,
does not serve your spirit,” author Tom Hodskinson writes. Nor, I would
argue, does the fear that propels you through the mall in December.

“Time should be savoured, not endured,” Hodgkinson writes, and can you
dispute him?

Starting with 8 a.m. (“Waking Up is Hard to Do”) and working all the way
around the clock, Hodgkinson tells us how, and why, to attain a serene,
fulfilling idleness no matter the time of day. His chapters on “The
Death of Lunch” and “Time for Tea” are particularly good; “Party Time”
(3 a.m.) ponders the benefits of sex, drugs and dancing but also points
out, “the real lesson of hedonism is that we should attempt to enjoy all
moments, not just those ones when we are out of are heads.” (Hodgkinson
also says that if anything should be enough to scare one away from
excessive drinking, it’s the prospect of a life in “the programme” that
is Alcoholics Anonymous.) He’s just as thoughtful on the importance of
the post-party chill-out session as on the party itself, and he gives
space to those “dark nights of the soul” that are the other side of 3
a.m.

How
to Be Idle is both whimsical and substantive, sometimes humorous and
sometimes serious, most often both simultaneously, to wit: “If we
realized that meditation simply means staring into space, then it would
be more accessible to more people. It’s easy.”

The
Idler, an online zine Hodgkinson edits, awaits your idle moments at
www.idler.co.uk; he also points us to whywork.org, a Web site run by a
group of people very seriously promoting “viable alternatives to wage
slavery.” (Hodgkinson holds that the idea that idleness is a sin was
invented by capitalist bosses who profit when the rest of us work like
soulless machines.)

Most of all, Hodgkinson seems to want to banish the self-flagellation
that accompanies moments of idleness these days. (His mother used to
scream at him to get out of bed; he carried the guilt about his “morning
slothfulness” for years.)

It’s a small book, good for idling with, a perfect café read – though
Hodgkinson would prefer you choose a lazy local café over a bustling,
industrious chain.